a mere
complement of higher modes of life, becomes, when useless, the ornament
of lower conditions: what we call great virtues are little regarded by
the saints. It was long before I began to think how the tapestry could
have come there, or to what it owed the honour given it in the house.

On the opposite wall hung another object, which may well have been the
cause of my carelessness about the former--attracting to itself all my
interest. It was a sword, in a leather sheath. From the point, half way
to the hilt, the sheath was split all along the edge of the weapon. The
sides of the wound gaped, and the blade was visible to my prying eyes.
It was with rust almost as dark a brown as the scabbard that infolded
it. But the under parts of the hilt, where dust could not settle,
gleamed with a faint golden shine. That sword was to my childish eyes
the type of all mystery, a clouded glory, which for many long years I
never dreamed of attempting to unveil. Not the sword Excalibur, had it
been 'stored in some treas